The US commercial property markets attracted a smattering of new cross-border investors in 2009, who together accounted for just under $1 billion in acquisitions. They were led by Dutch pension giant PGGM, which acquired seven apartment properties for $328 million last year. PGGM has already made its first 2010 deal, like the other a JV with Behringer Harvard on a senior living complex in Orange County, CA.

Five countries from Asia Pacific accounted for just over a third of the new cross-border total, with South Korea’s Kumho Investment Bank and Singapore’s Keck Seng making the second- and third-largest new foreign investments. Keck Seng’s $88 million acquisition of the W Hotel San Francisco was one of several marquee deals by the new cross-border buyers, as was Kumho’s purchase of AIG’s Manhattan HQ and Goldbond Group’s retail acquisition on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. These investments are a further indication of the continuing attraction of top-quality US assets in primary markets. In EMEA, only the UK, Israel and the Netherlands provided new investors. Six new Canadian groups entered the US market for the first time, but they accounted for less than 10% of new foreign investment and were collectively outspent by a single purchase by new Argentinean arrival, Consultatio SA, which acquired the Sonesta Beach Resort in Biscayne Bay, FL for $78 million. Like Consultatio, 12 of the 18 new foreign investors acquired only a single US property in 2009.

Data subject to future revision; based on properties & portfolios $5 mil and greater.
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